


pax tecum

by introductory



Category: The 4400
Genre: Cousin Incest, Episode Tag, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Religious Themes, Wordcount: 1.000-5.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-06
Updated: 2015-03-06
Packaged: 2018-03-16 01:53:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3470042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/introductory/pseuds/introductory
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Finally Kyle sighs, long and slow. "How did you know you could do it?" he says quietly, without turning to look at Shawn. "What I had, it wasn't -- I wasn't <em>sick</em>, Shawn. How did you know it was gonna work?"</p><p>[Episode tag for 2.13.]</p>
            </blockquote>





	pax tecum

**Author's Note:**

> For [Amber](http://momentia.tumblr.com).
> 
> Missing scene/episode tag for 2.13, "Mommy's Bosses." Some cousin-kissing, nothing further.

Shawn comes back to himself with Kyle's face barely inches away from his own. "Shawn," Kyle's saying, sounding almost frightened, "wake up, please, Shawn -- "

"K -- " Shawn's throat feels like sandpaper. He swallows hard and tries again. "Kyle?"

" _Shawn_ ," says Kyle, and even through blurry eyes Shawn can see his entire expression breaking into relief. "Don't pass out on me again, okay?"

"Again? Kyle, man," he says, blinking hard and trying to get his eyes to focus, "how -- how much'd you let me drink?"

"What?" Kyle pulls away for a moment, though he doesn't let go of Shawn's shoulders, grip so tight it almost hurts. "Shawn, we weren't drinking. You . . . you don't remember?" 

"No, man, nothing. Shit, I must've blacked out." Shawn looks over Kyle's shoulder: he doesn't recognize this place, and he's sure he'd never forget a decor job _this_ bad. "Where are we? This someone's parents's house?" 

"We're in your office at the Center," says Kyle, eyebrows drawing together in worry. "The 4400 Center?" When Shawn just shakes his head, Kyle releases him, halfway to standing up. "I think maybe you got a concussion, Shawn, I'm gonna see if I can get a doctor -- "

Shawn reaches out and catches him by the shoulder. "Wait, Kyle, I'm fine," he says, oddly sure of it. "Besides, I still remember you, what else do I need to know?"

Kyle doesn't return his smile, though. "You really don't remember the 4400? Coming back in a big ball of light?" He turns his face away for a moment. "Shawn, don't you remember Jordan Collier?"

"Huh? I don't know anybody named -- "

_Jordan._

Shawn's stomach drops. 

It all comes back to him at once: Highland Beach, Uncle Tommy, Kyle lying still in a hospital bed -- "You were in a coma," breathes Shawn, horrified. "Oh, god, I remember, I remember now." Running away from home, coming here to the Center, finding a place at Jordan's side --

Watching him bleed out under his powerless hands.

"Oh, god, Jordan's dead," says Shawn, pulling away from Kyle, curling in on himself. "Jordan's _dead,_ Kyle. I couldn't save him. I tried. I _tried_ \-- "

It's like he's feeling the grief and pain for the very first time; Shawn wishes those blissful few minutes of ignorance could have lasted forever. Just when he manages to choke back the worst of it, though, he's hit by something even more terrible, making it suddenly clear why Kyle is staring at him with his face twisted in guilt.

"I'm sorry," says Kyle. "Shawn, I'm _sorry_."

Shawn shakes his head, like it'll shake the pieces of his mind back into place. "It wasn't you, Kyle," he says through gritted teeth. His emotions are a mess, sorrow and loss and anger all mixed up inside, but if there's one thing he knows it's that Kyle -- _his_ Kyle -\- would never voluntarily take another life. "It was whatever was inside of you. I remember that much. And -- " He licks his dry lips. "At least I was able to save _you_."

"Yeah," says Kyle quietly, somehow looking even more unhappy. "And now I'm thinking -- maybe you shouldn't have." 

"What? Kyle, no, don't say that."

Kyle looks down at his hands. "You keep saving me and I just keep making things worse. You should have just left me in the coma, Shawn -- none of this would have happened."

"Don't _say_ that," Shawn says. "You're my best friend. I _had_ to wake you up, don't even think I should've left you there."

"Why, so I could kill an innocent man just like the future planned it?" And it's awful, Kyle's barriers are going up, shutting him out just like he had when they'd talked on the steps. "You -- you did what you thought was best, Shawn, but you were wrong. I'm sorry."

He does stand up then; on instinct Shawn grabs him by the hand before letting go. "Kyle," he says, "Kyle, wait." He drags himself into a less uncomfortable position, setting his back against the couch, and after a long moment Kyle sits down beside him on Jordan's ugly rug and draws his knees up to rest his chin against, their elbows bumping as if they were kids again and sitting at the foot of Kyle's bed reading issues of _Spider-Man_ and sharing a plate of pizza bites.

They stay like that for a while. Shawn doesn't know what Kyle's thinking and he can't even pretend to understand how messed-up Kyle must feel, but he hopes Kyle knows he can talk about it. Shawn's smart enough to realize he's the stronger one right now: it's been weeks since Jordan's death, and he's had a lot of time to work it out and try to move forward, but Kyle hasn't had a quarter of the time, or the support, that Shawn did. If Shawn wants to be angry and upset, he can do it later on his own time. For now, he just stares at the apples on the table and wonders whose job it is to make sure he never runs out, and if it's possible to switch to oranges instead.

Finally Kyle sighs, long and slow. "How did you know you could do it?" he says quietly, without turning to look at Shawn. "What I had, it wasn't -- I wasn't _sick,_ Shawn. How did you know it was gonna work?"

Shawn shrugs. "I guess I just did."

"It could have killed you," says Kyle. "You don't know what could have happened -- "

"What _happened_ is I'm still here," says Shawn, nudging Kyle with his entire body. "And more importantly, Kyle, you're free now. I'd do it again if I had to."

He would. Even if it wasn't Kyle; but especially _because_ it was  Kyle -- his cousin, his best friend, who'd been carrying around something dark and unknowable inside of him, something that used him and hurt him and left him with a guilt that wasn't his. Kyle didn't deserve that. No one does. 

"I wish you hadn't had to do it in the first place," says Kyle. "Whoever sent you back, they've got some pretty screwed-up ideas about right and wrong. That's the future you're supposed to be saving?"

"I . . . I don't know," admits Shawn. "No one knows. Anything can change at any minute, you know? But that's why I have to do this." He sighs, thinking about how lost he gets sometimes, searching for guidance no one alive can provide. "I have to look out for everybody here in the present. Maia, Richard, Heather, Alana -- we're in danger _now_ , and it's my job to keep all of us safe."

"That's so much responsibility," murmurs Kyle. "You shouldn't have to do all this."

"There isn't anyone else," says Shawn. It's only partly a lie: Richard's proven himself to be more than capable, and Lily and Heather are the most skillful organizers he's ever met, but they aren't _Jordan_. It isn't fair to fault them for it, but none of them comes even close to having Jordan's  vision -- they were all always looking to Jordan, too, just like Shawn.

Kyle touches him briefly on the elbow, strangely tentative. "I didn't really get it before," he says. "Why Jordan Collier was so important -- I think I'm starting to get it now."

"Jordan _believed_ ," says Shawn. "All I had to really had do was believe in _him_ , and the rest of it made total sense. Without him, it's all . . . I'm just trying my best, you know?"

"He meant a lot to you," says Kyle. He turns his face, makes eye contact with Shawn for a split-second before dropping his gaze away. "I'm sorry, Shawn."

"I loved him," says Shawn, swallowing hard. "I can't explain it, but -- I did. He gave me faith and I -- I loved him for it. For what he did for all of us." 

"I'm sorry," says Kyle. "I took him from you. I didn't mean to do it -- "

Shawn turns to Kyle and puts his hand on the back of his neck, pulls him in so close their foreheads are touching. "I _know_ ," he says, and he does. "I know you didn't."

"I didn't mean to hurt you," Kyle says, voice cracking, and the sound makes Shawn's heart ache, so much he can't stand to hear it again, so much he can't help tilting his head and kissing Kyle on the cheek, once, twice, and then on his trembling, open mouth. Kyle tenses, but he doesn't pull away -- doesn't ask Shawn what he thinks he's doing kissing his cousin, kissing a murderer, doesn't do anything all all.

"I know, Kyle," says Shawn, against the corner of Kyle's mouth, "I know." 

"I'm sorry," Kyle whispers. 

Shawn kisses him again. "I know."

Kyle's lips taste like salt and Shawn doesn't know which one of them is crying or if it's both. He slides his hand up into Kyle's soft hair and keeps kissing him, light and chaste, absolving him more with every one. Kyle turns his whole body towards Shawn, hands trapped between the two of them; kisses Shawn back like he thinks he doesn't deserve to be touched. 

"Shawn," he says, and doesn't say anything more. 

Eventually they break for air, and Shawn pulls Kyle over him, into his lap; there's no friction, no fire stirring inside of him, just an urgent need to touch and feel and give comfort, find comfort, in the simplest way he knows how. He slides his arms around his cousin's back, and the weight of him against Shawn's chest is something he thinks he could carry, at least for a little while.

"I love you, Kyle," he says, and he does, just as much as he did a year ago, a month, an hour. "And I forgive you."

This time it's Kyle who closes the distance between them, and Shawn accepts it unconditionally, takes each proffered kiss from Kyle's warm lips. It feels so natural, like they should have been doing this their whole lives; Shawn only regrets that they waited till _now_ , that it took a man's death to bring them here.

"I have to go," says Kyle at last, quietly, and this close Shawn can see his lips trembling. "My dad -- if he figures out where I went he's not gonna let me do it."

"Don't go," says Shawn, despite himself, palm on the back of Kyle's bowed neck. Jordan's gone, and Shawn may have loved him but he's loved Kyle since before they were old enough to walk, since before he even knew what the word meant, and he can't lose Kyle, too. Not now, not ever.

But Kyle's already pulling away. "I can't," he says. "You know I can't. I'm sorry."

"I'm going with you," says Shawn, sitting up further, but Kyle shakes his head. "Kyle -- "

"No," says Kyle. "I don't want you there." He kisses Shawn for a long, slow moment, hands cupping Shawn's face. "Write to me, okay?"

"I will," Shawn promises him. "Just like all those summers you were at camp. I will, Kyle."

"I love you," says Kyle, and Shawn's heard the words from him before but never like this, like it's the most fundamental truth in the universe. Like it's gospel. Shawn leans up to press a kiss to Kyle's forehead, to each fluttering eyelid, each cheek, the tip of his nose, and finally to Kyle's lips, parted in a sigh. 

Jordan used to talk about sacrifice, about giving up that which meant the most to you; had told Shawn that leaving home to join the rest of the 4400 was more than sacrifice enough. Shawn believed him, sure that nothing could possibly hurt more than giving up his family -- walking away from his mom, from Danny, from Uncle Tommy -- but he's realizing now that he was wrong. 

Somehow, he'd never imagined he might ever have to give up Kyle.

"Don't go," he says through his tears, knowing full well that Kyle can't. "Stay with me."

"I have to go, Shawn," says Kyle. This time Shawn lets him.


End file.
